Today had started out on a great note - the first ascent of the highpoint of Terrell County in the history of man, not counting the guys who built an old fence up there some time in the distant past. At least for us community of highpoint head-cases in the county highpoint group, Bob Martin and I had deflowered Terrell County before anyone else. Now we set our sights on the highpoint of Pecos County, "next door" to Terrell County to the west. Our objective: the Glass Mountains, which run northeast to southwest and extend into Brewster County. The Glass Mountains are the first real range of peaks one would see driving west toward the Big Bend if coming from places like Del Rio. The range highpoint is somewhere in Brewster County, but a sub-peak of the range gives Pecos County its highest point. Unfortunately, the range sits behind gated ranches and private property, too far in to just hop the fence and make a run for it. I had written a permission request letter to whom I believed to be the landowner (based on what the county asessor's office told me), but she replied she was not the owner, sorry she couldn't help. So when Bob and I showed up, we had nothing to go on.

First, we simply tried the ranch gate for the Brooks Ranch, which includes the lands in the hills as well as the low-lying flats between the hills and us out on the highway (US-385). It's easy to know you're at the Brooks Ranch gate: foot-high metal letters in red paint spell it out for you. And ... the gate was open! This was a possible stroke of luck. We agreed I would stay by the highway while Bob drove in to the ranch headquarters to seek out permission. So I waited for Bob, probably close to 45 minutes, until he came back with the news: no news. No one was home. We opted against just going in anyway since there was the possibility some one could show up afterwards and lock the gate, locking us in. We drove up a couple miles to another residence, where Bob engaged the man who lived there, an old grizzled-looking fellow but super friendly. He knew the landowner, and explained they live up in Odessa, and gave us their contact information. Outstanding!

We tried calling the landowner, but our cell phones had trouble getting a signal out this way so we drove south into the town of Marathon. There, we used the pay-phone and made repeated attempts to contact the man, each time getting his secretary and a promise he'd be back. So Bob and I simply hung around town, Bob trying the phone every half hour or so. Finally, about 2-ish, he got the guy on the phone, and the landowner gave us the okay, and that his son would actually be staying the night at the ranch complex there that night. The landowner told us to meet him at the gate around 4 or so, and that he'd let his son know that we'd be there. Outstanding! The only downside: the weather had become very windy, which I understand is very common in these here parts. It was dust-storm, tumbleweed wind.

We drove back south to the Brooks Ranch gate and stayed there, hanging by the side of the road for awhile waiting for the son to arrive. In the meantime a ranch-hand showed up and wondered what we were up to, but he was cool, and then the son showed up, so it was four of us shaking hands and saying our greetings. The son (forget his name) was a college-age kid, but real cool and very interested in our little endeavor. We convoyed to the ranch house, talked a bit, then before it got too late, Bob and I went off to do our highpoint. We promised to stop in on our way out. So finally, we were off to visit the Pecos County highpoint. From the ranch house we (now in Bob's truck) followed some rough 4-wheel drive tracks a little over a mile to a flat bench of sparse juniper, where we parked strategically next to a fence line, elevation 4,800 feet according to the map. It was close to 5 p.m. when we started, so we grabbed our flashlights just in case.

From the vehicle we went northwest through thickish scrubby forest, mainly juniper and lots of weedy brush. The going was slow but doable. We had to cross through a tight drainage, which we avoided by staying high on the hillsides, hiking by sight toward a peak, elevation 5,360 feet according to the map. This wasn't our highpoint but it was close. Past the drainage things opened up a bit, and we made our ways up the hillsides a couple hundred feet, working by sight to the summit. All this is about an hour of hiking, covering a mile and 600 feet of gain. The summit was marked by a large cairn. Some contending bumps on the ridge line were quickly ruled out by simple observation. The wind was fierce, easily gusts up to 40 miles per hour. We stayed in the lee of the wind, got a few photos but didn't stick around long as it was getting dark. The hike out went faster, the only event being Bob walking into an agave plant and getting some shin daggers. We made our way up the drainage again to the elevated juniper bench where our truck was parked, but now we had barely any light left. The junipers were thick enough to prohibit any long views, so we hiked ... into the fence, which worked well because we followed it back right to the truck. By now it was totally dark. We drove out to say goodbye to the son back at the ranch house, then left the premises, happy that we'd got the okay to hike the Pecos highpoint, which was most unexpected.

From here we backtracked into Terrell County for some amusing attempts at the Val Verde County highpoint the next day. See the Terrell County report for some details, and this page for more details (scroll to Val Verde).